


A King's Journey

by Fienf



Series: The New World [2]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Katekyou Hitman Reborn!
Genre: Gen, Lowkey death, Mentions of Yakuza, Not Beta'd, Unreliable Narrator, major character death but not
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-14
Updated: 2019-04-17
Packaged: 2020-01-13 02:15:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,848
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18459374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fienf/pseuds/Fienf
Summary: Poor little Alice fell down the rabbit hole, leading to a place no one woud've guessed..~Inspired by some Celtic/Irish/Scottish myth





	1. The beginning

**Author's Note:**

> Yall.... I was gonna write this, then I did, then it got deleted on accident. I quite like this version a lot more though, for being written at one o clock in the morning. My rewritten "Silence" chapter got thanos snapped too so I guess it balanced out :/  
> see yall next time!

Sawada Tsunayoshi was a strange child. For one, he always the one who ended up in the strangest situations, like now.

 

~

It had been a long day for him, seemingly endless tests bombarded him from every class, not to mention the snickers! Every classmate seemed to laugh at his dismay and despair, knowing he was going to fail all of them.

Thank crayons it was all done now and he could go home to his mother’s wonderful cooking. Maybe it was salisbury steak tonight? Tsuna groaned, he forgot to ask! Dangit! Clicking his tongue, he continued walking home.

His school wasn’t far away from his house, definitely a shorter distance than secondary school and a lot less scarier too with the demon occupying secondary. Good thing he wouldn’t be there for a while, although time was known to be tricky. He just hoped it wouldn’t take as long to make everyone call him Tsuna instead of Sawada or, crayons forbid, Tsunayoshi. He shuddered, who decided it would be a good idea to give him that many syllables.

Tsuna paused, didn’t his mother need him to pick up some eggs from the store on his way home? Yeah...she did. Backpedaling, he walked a couple more blocks to the left and ignored the curious stares directed to him. As if he needed more anxiety.

Not many people were at the market at the moment, a few mothers with babies, a few older kids, a few other people too. No one really interesting, although he really didn’t expect there to be any interesting people when he wasn’t even in the main part of the marketplace and he already bought a carton of eggs.

“What did I tell you brats? You bring the good stuff over to Akane and she’ll do the rest. You literally only had one job and no one blinks at kids with backpacks!” Hissed a gruff voice to Tsuna’s left...right in an alleyway. Well crap, this very well could be the day he dies- and it’s from some yakuza bickering!

“Sorry big brother! We didn’t know Rico would’ve taken them!” He recognized that voice! It was Rin, from his class! With foreign looks, he was quite popular, but big eyes and honeyed hair were his only good features for him. It was like Cinderella except he was one of the sisters with his good looks and horrible personality.

“Yeah! It wasn’t our fault!” What the?! Kenshiro too?! Tsuna stopped and looked over, two shady looking people held his classmates against the wall.

“You’ll have to pay in...other ways now. The big boss doesn’t like it when stuff goes wrong.” The man spoke again and didn’t that just sound all kinds of nice? Like getting your head chewed off by beetles and cockroaches. Fun.  
Groaning, he slid his hand down his face. Time to do something really stupid, hopefully they’ll be so grateful after this they’d become his friends and everything would be all hunkydory. Hah, like that would happen.

“Hey!” He shouted, “Rin, do you remember the math homework we were supposed to do? Because I sure don’t , want to help me?” All eyes zoomed on him and the two dudes hunched over his classmates straightened up and shoved the kids into the wall. The furthest one slid a smirk onto his face. Oh yeah, time to something really stupid indeed.

“Hey there kiddo, what’d you need with Rin here? We’ll be done with him real quickly if you wanted to join in?” The one closest to him spoke. Something wasn’t quite right about it though. Almost as if the words themselves were latching onto his very psyche and pulling it in to agree with the man. A high pitched whine underlaid his voice too and stretched some of the words longer than normal.

Shivers ran up Tsuna’s spine. He really shouldn’t have done this.

“Ye-yeah I wanted to know if he could help me with the science homework but-but if I’m intruding I can just leave!” The longer he was around them, the more Tsuna needed to leave. Something wasn’t right about these two and he’d be damned if he got caught up with this. Hopefully the news won’t show Rin and Kenshiro missing or worse, dead. That would really suck.

“Oh? But didn’t you just say you needed help with your math homework?” Oh no. He really screwed up now.

“Both!”

“Uh huh…” Nooooo he didn’t need this now. Tsuna backed up and ran. “Rin, Kenshiro, get him!” Why was he getting children to chase after another child!?

Pant pant pant, pant pant pant, last place in physical education class, pant pant pant, and he’s still outrunning these weirdos haha. 

Somehow, they all managed to run to the forest from practically the middle of Namimori. How the demon or his classmates didn’t manage to snag him was a miracle. What gods were sleeping today?

Too bad they were running at his heels, he’d normally make it into kind man Kawahira’s shop - or his portable stall depending on his mood apparently- but not today. Tsuna actually felt bad with how often he ran into his place to hide without buying anything but Kawahira waved off his worried - “Just do me a favor in the future”. No matter how much he asked though, Tsuna could never figure out what the man meant by favor though, he hoped it wasn’t something bad. 

Zig zagging, he hopped over every fat root and uneven ground he saw. Unknown to him though, he even hopped over the ones he didn’t see. Tsuna would be the luckiest person alive if the eggs managed to survive.

Luck never lasted long though and he tripped on a root and barrel rolled down a hill. 

(What the heck?!? What would he tell his mom?! The eggs were definitely destroyed now.)

Tsuna groaned and sat up, egg carton in hand and the other hand clutched to his head. Despite being in a forest, he vaguely recognised chatter and music over his throbbing head. Did Rin and Kenshiro manage to grab him and take him back to their base or something? That wouldn’t explain the eggs in his hand though.

“Hey kid, where’s your mask?”


	2. Chapter 2 - A short

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Jack does a bit of walking around and his style of narration matches his mind, aka unreliable narration

 Jack had been having a good day. It was the start of the food festival, the new dead festival, and, more importantly, the moon festival. The moon festival came only every twelve years and, even rarer, Betelgeuse and his entourage would be coming to visit the festival. Less importantly, the new dead festival. It only came around every other month but, fortunately for a mask maker like him, it also meant a whole flood of people who would need his services. The day had already gone by relatively well with at least ten people in the first hour. After that though, customers came in haphazardly and with dinner time steadfast approaching, Jack didn’t think he’d get any more customers today.

 

 With all the festivals going on, the whole event would last at least two weeks. For reasons unknown, Betelgeuse decided that each festival would have a set amount of days for all of them and they all varied, compared to the one day festivals in the upperworld. The moon festival was by far the longest lasting one with a set amount of twelve days - a whole week!- but it was closely followed by the festival of knowledge and the festival of courage, both lasting six days.

 

 He moaned at the thought of all the fun that would be had after the flow of people died in his shop. Different stalls and areas were dedicated to all sorts of things, from foods to games to other general stuff being sold, like his masks. With the way the city was set up, deigned to cause confusion and fun, Jack was sure he’d be able to find something worth his while the last week of the festival and especially with it being the festival of the moon as well...everyone knew Betelgeuse liked to make the city’s movements even more erratic.

 

 Jack paused in his reverie, “Oh crap, what if I lose my shop like last time! It took me two hours to track it down - and that was with help! Noooo-”

 

 “Sweet baby carrots, what are you whining about this time , Skij?”A feminine voice vibrated over his. He knew that voice - it was Layla! He straightened up from his slouched position and eyed her presence in the middle of his shop. She wore her normal mask, jeans, and a baggy purple blouse. Cute.

 

 “Heyy Layla~ Fancy seeing you here.” Jack leaned over the decorated cardboard counter, he couldn’t afford a good counter with the city’s shifts, “Come here of-”

 

 “Shut up. Just shup ut. Egh, shut up, you know what I meant.” She interrupted then straightened, “You know what I’m here for. What I’m always here for.” Then, under her breath, “I don’t know why Betelgeuse thinks we’d be good together, egh.”He was pretty sure he wasn’t meant to hear that but it put such a big grin on his face he couldn’t help it. Layla was an amazing person, so kind with everyone and their conversation and personality styles matched so well! Not to mention she was pretty dang beautiful if he said so himself, not that he ever saw her outside her mask. No one really went anywhere without their mask.

 

 Thank you, Betelgeuse. “Yep! A couple of Betelgeuse style servant masks and a few specialized masks for Jade, Mick, Jay, Canyon, and Nettle, right?”

 

 She hummed and rocked on her heels, “Mhm...Can you also make another one for me? The one I have now is a little bit cracked and I would hate to have to come back all the way over here without a mask” Funnily enough, he didn’t think she’d have to go far with being one of Betelgeuse’s favorites. Her mask was easy to make too, plain white with a single Clematis facing outward. It adorned her mask’s left cheek wonderfully and signified her in a way only flowers could on blank slates.

 

 His own plain mask held no comparison bar the base color. Perhaps, he thought, it was better that way. They’d never get together no matter how much he vied. Maybe he should make a mask resembling those old drama masks? That would be fun.

 

 “No probs Layl’s-”

 

 “Layla”

 

 “Right- I was gonna give you a discount at first but ouch, so rude!” He could feel the glare under her mask. “Kidding~! Thirty percent off all masks for the moon festival but I’ll bump yours up to a good fifty percent.”

 

 Layla stopped bouncing and he could see how her mask moved in response to her smile. “Thank you, Skij.” And there goes that nickname again! Jack’s official title may be ‘Shop-Keep Jack’ but that didn’t mean it was okay to shorten it to SKJ  or the phonetic version of it either!

 

 “Uh huh.” He pretended to eye his fingernails and clean them, brushing aside the bit of irritation.

 

 It had the desired effect and she made a guttural sound, “Spit it out.”

 

 “Weeeell, we still gotta talk business so- how many masks are we talking in particular, when’s the due date, and what are the specifics of them?” Jack stood at his full five foot eight stature, hyper aware of the masks surrounding them now. Spaced apart with a foot between each of the hung up ones and seemingly framed by his shop’s dark blue tent curtain, they appeared to turn a bit and stare at him. Even the ones stacked on each other in the boxes felt like it. Creeepy.

 

 “Ten servants masks, the aforementioned masks, and someone will come to pick them up in about ten days.” Layla paused and put her hands behind her back and started rocking on her heels again, “I heard Betelgeuse himself will come to pick them up so do have them ready in tip top condition. You wouldn't want to anger the lord of this land, would you?”Oh hell no, he felt shivers up his spine just thinking about it!

 

 Betelgeuse rarely ever got angry but the last time he did...the tales he heard were enough to stop any thought against him. Jack himself wasn't old enough to remember but the elders, the residents of Combio far older than the Egyptians, never lied. After all, what reason would they have? Nothing was waiting for those who lied except for ostracism.

 Not that Betelgeuse would get so angry over missing some masks, right? He hoped not.

 

 “I think I’ll have to skip outta that. No thank you haha.” Jack kept his grin up as his eyelids shut, standing straight with his hands behind his back- just as Layla had done.

 

 She hummed, “Okay, I’ll take my leave now. The money will be transferred over tomorrow- happy festival time.” Then she left, doing an about face.

 

 Jack dropped his smile and relaxed. Huh, he was tense...and alone, now that he thinks about it. A good time to drink something and eat something too. He could probably get away with going out and eating dinner nearby. Miss June was making some of her lumpia tonight too so that’s a plus.

 

 He got up and stretched his arms. The town would move dramatically tonight, he could tell. That meant he had to get what he needed quickly and return or else he’d never find his stall. A couple steps forwards and he was out of the stall, people crowding him on all sides.

 

 All around him were people of all shapes, colors, and ethnicities. They weren’t pushing to move, like the crowd would on a normal festival day, but more like occasionally bumping shoulders. Stalls, if you could call them that, lined every inch and was stacked on top of each other, reminiscent of the way tall apartment buildings would lean on top of each other asymmetrically while they rotted. Ropes and chains and other firm materials like vines hung from everywhere to get the people to any stall they needed to maximize efficiency of the area. 

 

 Lanterns, paper,charms, and stall signs decorated the area and lighting up where they needed as ropes hung horizontally from stall to stall haphazardly. Animals- omens, as people called them - crawled and flew everywhere. Some of the stalls were open, some had lights or signs to show they were open, and some were completely dark and closed, like his would soon be.

 

 “Hey Jack~” A feminine voice from behind him called out.  _ Great. _

 

   Putting on a fake grin, even if she couldn’t see it, he greeted her. “Hello Clementine, how are you today?” It was his job to make sure people would try to buy his products, he would not give incentive not to buy his stuff.

 

 “Oh I’m doing fine!” She let out a giggle, he could tell where this was going “You’re a handsome man, Jack, why don’t you take the stress off your shoulders with me?” and sinker.  Not.

 

 Clementine worked for the Desiree’s Service, a consort business. While they treated their workers well, from what he could hear, they were a relatively small business and having their stall near his would only mean profit for them and raised eyebrows for him. 

 

 Not that Jack blamed them, even if the usual mask makers near consorts are symbiotes to the business. They masked their clients, making it so most people won’t recognize them with different masks, and in turn the consort business in question would provide business for the both of them. It was a win win for all parties.

 

 Their stall was pretty though, he had to admit, even though the inside was more sinful. It consisted of the front room with a few chairs then a counter with two doors on each side, everything made of wood. Lamps lit the whole room as an Omen animal sprawled on the counter.How Desiree’s Service got an Omen animal on their side was a mystery. Omen animals only attached themselves to those they saw worthy and could take the shape of any animal they liked. Legend had it, Betelgeuse and his friends had whole menageries of them as they themselves created the Omen animals. If that were so though, then that would mean Betelgeuse and co. had bad naming systems because even the name ‘Omen Animal’ was weird.

 

 His stall was obviously different from theirs, being draped in dark blue fabric with golden stars and swirls and small, classic, theater masks depicting the tragedy and comedic. It was always something he was fascinated with as a child but that didn’t matter right now, he was conversing with someone and it was rude to zone out.

 

 “Sorry, Clementine, I’m only out for a bit, the stalls are changing soon.” Maybe he could get out of this?

 

 “Aww alright. I’ll be here if you ever change your mind~! And I thought I told you to call me Clem? We are friends, after all.” Maybe but the way she leaned over her stall’s counter meant she didn’t want that to last. Or get in the way, he didn’t know but he hoped she left him alone.

 

 “Alright…” He grumbled and started walking away, with no intention or even the slightest thought of ever going in there. No, his heart was dedicated to Layla, even if it was one sided. The only way that would ever go away is if Layla herself told him and Jack doubted that with how often she came around - which is to say, never.

 

_  Ughh _ , he was such a hopeless romantic! Even as stalls stacked up on top of each other, all with different heights, dimensions, and decorations, all his mind could think about was Layla! She was practically tattooed on the back of his eyelids, all he needed at this point was something romantic like ‘Besame Mucho’ to get stuck in his head.

 

 It wasn’t fair.

 

 C’mon Jack, you grew up in a pretty rank neighborhood, you know fair isn’t always an option.

 

 True, but who cared at this point. Even though everyone around him tried to hide it, they were all dead. This was the famed afterlife everyone thought of at some point. It didn’t feature angels, pits of despair, reincarnation, some version of ‘heaven’ or anything else like that. It was basically them all in this new world with new rules and beings governed by the area’s master or form of government. Sure, you didn’t feel hungry or thirsty or anything of the like but you could still feel discomfort and pain which more than covered it. You could still die.

 

  It was really hard to describe this place without having to set aside an hour of explanation.

 

 With all these distracting thoughts, Jack walked around, discarding the idea of getting some actual food and eventually into a stall named “The Kicker’s Liquor” with an open curtain in a sort of tent style - like his own, his mind appreciated - and sat down on one of the seats near the back. Amusingly, even though it was decorated like a renaissance fair tent, it actually held a more fantasy like tavern with a counter in front of rows of liquor and tables everywhere ranging from circular to long and rectangular. To top it off, it was dimly lit too to make it easier on drunken eyes as well as concealing a good bit .It wasn’t that late so thankfully it wasn’t packed but the place still held a lot of people inside, about half full. Good enough for him though, it still definitely held a rustic charm.

 

 Speaking of charms, it looked like they finally got a charm where you could walk in freely but you had to exit doors framed with walls in order to get out. On the flip side, it looked at blurred looking in so to actually see what’s inside, you had to go inside. Huh. That would be good for all sorts of things - anonymity, hiding, illegal activities , et cetera. 

 

 Dang, this place really was a thing out of fantasy books, no wonder Clementine recommended it.

 

 Jack sat down at the booth right next to the door, staring down those who stared back at the newcomer. Thankfully, the area was clean, if a bit uncomfortable with everything being wood. 

 A voice cut through the staring match and someone stood in front of him ,  “Hello, welcome to The Kicker’s Liquor , what can I get you?” A woman with a cat mask drawled. She balanced a tray of food and drinks on her right knee as she looked at him expectantly, paper and pen in hand.

 

 “What do you recommend?” It seemed like the wrong answer as he watched her neck muscles constrict.

 

 “Well, I recommend the Beef Soup and Bread with some ale.”

 

 “I’ll go with that then, thank you.”

 

 “No problem.” She put the paper and pen away and steadied the tray into her hand. 

 

 Weird...shouldn’t there be more waiters? He wasn’t in the mood to sit alone in a tavern , now that he thought about it. The next time she came over here, he’d ask for the stuff to go and probably just wander until he found a good spot to rest or go home. Screw the consequences.

 

 More and more people filed in as he waited for his food, the hum of conversation getting louder as one of the larger tables started singing a tune.

 

 “Take one down and pass it around, twenty two bottles of wine on the wall! Twenty one bottles of-” Damn, they really were pissed, weren’t they?

 

 “And here’s your order, sir” The woman was back.

 “Ah! Thank you, can I get these to go though?”

 

~

 

 The place was really nice when there wasn't many people around, even if it gave him mild claustrophobia. Sure, there wasn't the sun to tell time right but a lot of people liked to rest inside for a bit when the ever eternal moon shifted to the new moon phase.

 

 The moon didn't follow Earth's ways of shifting every twenty eight days or so, no, it just had to stand out. It shifted to a different phase per ‘hour’ so there were twenty eight hours in a ‘day.’ This made it so anyone could sleep if they wanted to as well as giving them a way to tell time. How thoughtful Betelgeuse was.

 

 Too encompassed with the sky, Jack didn’t notice the body until it were too late.

 

 “Ouch, sonova - “ It was a kid. Couldn’t be older than 10, still wet behind the ears kind of kid. With no mask. Huh? He ended up waiting there his confusion, he squatted in front of the kid for what must have been five minutes, watching him wake up. Maybe it was how young he was, his foreign looks, or the fact he held no mask, but Jack felt the urge to ask the kid when normally he'd just let them drown.

 

 “Hey kid, where’s your mask?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this instead of taking notes - can you tell? Do you guys know how hard it is to write Python as well? Especially when the notes given is wrong?  
> My other work, Silence, is on a hiatus. Don't worry, I will get the first chapter rewrite done by this summer. I just accidentally erased the file and it's a little hard to start up again after that.  
> On another note, did you get some of the hints? Did you get who is who and what is what?   
> I have no beta reader. Is that obvious too, you eggs?


End file.
